George Brown

CHAPTER X

THE "DOUBLE SHUFFLE"

By his advocacy of representation by population, by his opposition to separate schools, and his championship of Upper Canadian rights, Mr.

Brown gained a remarkable hold upon the people. In the general elections of 1857 he was elected for the city of Toronto, in company with Mr. Robinson, a Conservative. The election of a Liberal in Toronto is a rare event, and there is no doubt that Mr. Brown"s violent conflict with the Roman Catholic Church contributed to his victory, if it was not the main cause thereof. His party also made large gains through Upper Canada, and had a large majority in that part of the province, so that the majority for the Macdonald government was drawn entirely from Lower Canada. Gross election frauds occurred in Russell county, where names were copied into the poll-books from old directories of towns in the state of New York, and of Quebec city, where such names as Julius Caesar, Napoleon Bonaparte, Judas Iscariot and George Washington appeared on the lists. The Reformers attacked these elections in parliament without success, but in 1859 the sitting member for Russell and several others were tried for conspiracy, convicted and sentenced to imprisonment. That the government felt itself to be much weakened throughout the country is evident from Mr. John A. Macdonald"s unsuccessful effort to add another to his list of political combinations by detaching Mr. John Sandfield Macdonald from the Reform party, offering seats in the cabinet to him and another Reformer. The personal attack on Mr. Brown in the session of 1858 has already been mentioned. The chief political event of the session was the "Double Shuffle."

On July 28th, 1858, Mr. Brown succeeded in placing the ministry in a minority on the question of the seat of government. Unable to decide between the conflicting claims of Toronto, Quebec, Montreal and Kingston, the government referred the question to the queen, who decided in favour of Ottawa. Brown had opposed the reference to the queen, holding that the question should be settled in Canada. He also believed that the seat of government should not be fixed until representation by population was granted, and all matters in dispute between Upper and Lower Canada arranged. He now moved against Ottawa and carried his motion. During the same sitting the government was sustained on a motion to adjourn, which by understanding was regarded as a test of confidence. A few hours later the ministers met and decided that, although they had been sustained by a majority of the House, "it behoved them as the queen"s servants to resent the slight which had been offered Her Majesty by the action of the a.s.sembly in calling in question Her Majesty"s choice of the capital." The governor-general, Sir Edmund Bond Head, sent for Mr. Brown as the leader of the Opposition to form a government. It was contended by Liberals that he ought not to have taken this step unless he intended to give Mr. Brown and his colleagues his full confidence and support.

If he believed that the defeat of the government was a mere accident, and that on general grounds it commanded a working majority in the legislature, he ought not to have accepted the resignation, unless he intended to sanction a fresh appeal to the country.

The invitation to form an administration was received by Mr. Brown on Thursday, July 28th. He at once waited on the governor-general and obtained permission to consult his friends. He called a meeting of the Upper Canadian members of his party in both Houses, and obtained from them promises of cordial support. With Dorion he had an important interview. Dorion agreed that the principle of representation by population was sound, but said that the French-Canadian people feared the consequences of Upper Canadian preponderance, feared that the peculiar inst.i.tutions of French Canada would be swept away. To a.s.sure them, representation by population must be accompanied by const.i.tutional checks and safeguards. Brown and Dorion parted in the belief that this could be arranged. They believed also that they could agree upon an educational policy in which religious instruction could be given without the evils of separation.

Though Mr. Brown"s power did not lie in the manipulation of combinations of men, he succeeded on this occasion in enlisting the services of colleagues of high character and capacity, including besides Dorion, Oliver Mowat, John Sandfield Macdonald, Luther Holton and L. T. Drummond. On Sat.u.r.day morning Mr. Brown waited upon the governor-general, and informed him that having consulted his friends and obtained the aid of Mr. Dorion, he was prepared to undertake the task of forming an administration. During the day the formation of the ministry was completed. "At nine o"clock on Sunday night," to give the story in Mr. Brown"s words, "learning that Mr. Dorion was ill, I went to see him at his apartments at the Rossin House, and while with him the governor-general"s secretary entered and handed me a despatch. No sooner did I see the outside of the doc.u.ment than I understood it all.

I felt at once that the whole corruptionist camp had been in commotion at the prospect of the whole of the public departments being subjected to the investigations of a second public accounts" committee, and comprehended at once that the transmission of such a despatch could have but the one intention of raising an obstacle in the way of the new cabinet taking office, and I was not mistaken."[11]

The despatch declared that the governor-general gave no pledge, express or implied, with reference to dissolution. When advice was tendered on the subject he would act as he deemed best. It then laid down, with much detail, the terms on which he would consent to prorogation. Bills for the registration of voters and for the prohibition of fraudulent a.s.signments and gifts by leaders should be enacted, and certain supplies obtained.

Mr. Brown criticized both these declarations. It was not necessary for the governor-general to say that he gave no pledge in regard to dissolution. To demand such a pledge would have been utterly unconst.i.tutional. The governor was quite right in saying that he would deal with the proposal when it was made by his advisers. But while he needlessly and gratuitously declared that he would not pledge himself beforehand as to dissolution, he took exactly the opposite course as to prorogation, specifying almost minutely the terms on which he would consent to that step. Brown contended that the governor had no right to lay down conditions, or to settle beforehand the measures that must be enacted during the session. This was an attempt to dictate, not only to the ministry, but to the legislature. Mr. Brown and his colleagues believed that the governor was acting in collusion with the ministers who had resigned, that the intriguers were taken by surprise when Brown showed himself able to form a ministry, and that the Sunday communication was a second thought, a hurriedly devised plan to bar the way of the new ministers to office.

On Monday morning before conferring with his colleagues, Brown wrote to the governor-general, stating that his ministry had been formed, and submitting that "until they have a.s.sumed the functions of const.i.tutional advisers of the Crown, he and his proposed colleagues will not be in a position to discuss the important measures and questions of public policy referred to in his memorandum." Brown then met his colleagues, who unanimously approved of his answer to the governor"s memorandum, and agreed also that it was intended as a bar to their acceptance of office. They decided not to ask for a pledge as to dissolution, nor to make or accept conditions of any kind. "We were willing to risk our being turned out of office within twenty-four hours, but we were not willing to place ourselves const.i.tutionally in a false position. We distinctly contemplated all that Sir Edmund Head could do and that he has done, and we concluded that it was our duty to accept office, and throw on the governor-general the responsibility of denying us the support we were ent.i.tled to, and which he had extended so abundantly to our predecessor."

When parliament a.s.sembled on Monday, a vote of want of confidence was carried against the new government in both Houses. The newly appointed ministers had, of course, resigned their seats in parliament in order that they might offer themselves for re-election. It is true the majority was too great to be accounted for by the absence of the ministers. But the result was affected by the lack, not only of the votes of the ministers, but of their voices. In the absence of ministerial explanation, confusion and misunderstanding prevailed. The fact that Brown had been able to find common ground with Catholic and French-Canadian members had occasioned surprise and anxiety. On the one side it was feared that Brown had surrendered to the French-Canadians, and on the other that the French-Canadians had surrendered to Brown.

The conference between Brown and Dorion shows that the government was formed for the same purpose as the Brown-Macdonald coalition of 1864--the settlement of difficulties that prevented the right working of the union. The official declaration of its policy contains these words: "His Excellency"s present advisers have entered the government with the fixed determination to propose const.i.tutional measures for the establishment of that harmony between Upper and Lower Canada which is essential to the prosperity of the province."

Dissolution was asked on the ground that the new government intended to propose important const.i.tutional changes, and that the parliament did not represent the country, many of its members owing their seals to gross fraud and corruption. Thirty-two seats were claimed from sitting members on these grounds. The cases of the Quebec and Russell election have already been mentioned. The member elected for Lotbiniere was expelled for violent interference with the freedom of election. Brown and his colleagues contended that these practices had prevailed to such an extent that the legislature could not be said to represent the country. Head"s reply was that the frauds were likely to be repeated if a new election were held; that they really afforded a reason for postponing the election, at least until more stringent laws were enacted. The dissolution was refused; the Brown-Dorion government resigned, and the old ministers were restored to office.

On the resignation of the Brown-Dorion ministry the governor called upon A. T. Galt, who had given an independent support to the Macdonald-Cartier government. During the session of 1858 he had placed before the House resolutions favouring the federal union of Canada, the Maritime Provinces and the North-West Territory, and it is possible that his advocacy of this policy had something to do with the offer of the premiership. As yet, however, he was not prominent enough, nor could he command a support large enough, to warrant his acceptance of the office, and he declined. Then followed the "Double Shuffle."

The Macdonald-Cartier government resumed office under the name of the Cartier-Macdonald government, with Galt taking the place of Cayley, and some minor changes. Const.i.tutional usage required that all the ministers should have returned to their const.i.tuents for re-election.

A means of evading this requirement was found. The statute governing the case provided that when any minister should resign his office and within one month afterwards accept another office in the ministry, he should not thereby vacate his seat. With the object of obviating the necessity for a new election, Cartier, Macdonald, and their colleagues, in order to bring themselves within the letter of the law, although not within its spirit, exchanged offices, each taking a different one from that which he had resigned eight days before.

Shortly before midnight of the sixth of August, they solemnly swore to discharge the duties of offices which several of them had no intention of holding; and a few minutes afterwards the second shuffle took place, and Cartier and Macdonald having been inspector-general and postmaster-general for this brief s.p.a.ce, became again attorney-general east and attorney-general west.

The belief of the Reformers that the governor-general was guilty of partiality and of intrigue with the Conservative ministers is set forth as part of the history of the time. There is evidence of partiality, but no evidence of intrigue. The biographer of Sir John Macdonald denies the charge of intrigue, but says that Macdonald and the governor were intimate personal friends.[12] Dent, who also scouts the charge of intrigue, says that the governor was prejudiced against Brown, regarding him as a mere obstructionist.[13]

The governor-general seems to have been influenced by these personal feelings, making everything as difficult as possible for Brown, and as easy as possible for Macdonald, even to the point of acquiescing in the evasion of the law known as the "Double Shuffle."

In the debate on confederation. Senator Ferrier said that a political warfare had been waged in Canada for many years, of a nature calculated to destroy all moral and political principles, both in the legislature and out of it. The "Double Shuffle" is so typical of this dreary and ign.o.ble warfare and it played so large a part in the political history of the time, that it has been necessary to describe it at some length. But for these considerations, the episode would have deserved scant notice. The headship of one of the ephemeral ministries that preceded confederation could add little to the reputation of Mr. Brown. His powers were not shown at their best in office, and the surroundings of office were not congenial to him. His strength lay in addressing the people directly, through his paper or on the platform, and in the hour of defeat or disappointment he turned to the people for consolation. "During these contests," he said some years afterwards, "it was this which sustained the gallant band of Reformers who so long struggled for popular rights: that, abused as we might be, we had this consolation, that we could not go anywhere among our fellow-countrymen from one end of the country to the other--in Tory const.i.tuencies as well as in Reform const.i.tuencies--without the certainty of receiving from the honest, intelligent yeomanry of the country--from the true, right-hearted, right-thinking people of Upper Canada, who came out to meet us--the hearty grasp of the hand and the hearty greeting that amply rewarded the labour we had expended in their behalf. That is the highest reward I have hoped for in public life, and I am sure that no man who earns that reward will ever in Upper Canada have better occasion to speak of the grat.i.tude of the people."

FOOTNOTES:

[11] Speech to Toronto electors, August, 1858.

[12] Pope"s _Memoirs of Sir John Macdonald_, Vol. I., pp. 133, 134.

[13] Dent"s _Last Forty Years_, Vol. II., pp. 379, 380.

CHAPTER XI

AGAINST AMERICAN SLAVERY

In his home in Scotland Brown had been imbued with a hatred of slavery. He spent several years of his early manhood in New York, and felt in all its force the domination of the slave-holding element.

Thence he moved to Canada, for many years the refuge of the hunted slave. It is estimated that even before the pa.s.sage of the Fugitive Slave Law, there were twenty thousand coloured refugees in Canada. It was customary for these poor creatures to hide by day and to travel by night. When all other signs failed they kept their eyes fixed on the North Star, whose light "seemed the enduring witness of the divine interest in their deliverance." By the system known as the "underground railway," the fugitive was pa.s.sed from one friendly house to another. A code of signals was used by those engaged in the work of mercy--pa.s.s words, peculiar knocks and raps, a call like that of the owl. Negroes in transit were described as "fleeces of wool," and "volumes of the irrepressible conflict bound in black."

The pa.s.sage of the Fugitive Slave Law deprived the negro of his security in the free states, and dragged back into slavery men and women who had for years been living in freedom, and had found means to earn their bread and to build up little homes. Hence an impetus was given to the movement towards Canada, which the slave-holders tried to check by talking freely of the rigours of the Canadian climate. Lewis Clark, the original of George Harris in _Uncle Tom"s Cabin_ was told that if he went to Canada the British would put his eyes out, and keep him in a mine for life. Another was told that the Detroit River was three thousand miles wide.

But the exodus to Canada went on, and the hearts of the people were moved to compa.s.sion by the arrival of ragged and foot-sore wanderers.

They found a warm friend in Brown, who paid the hotel bill of one for a week, gave fifty dollars to maintain a negro family, and besides numerous acts of personal kindness, filled the columns of the _Globe_ with appeals on behalf of the fugitives. Early in 1851 the Anti-Slavery Society of Canada was organized. The president was the Rev. Dr. Willis, afterwards princ.i.p.al of Knox Presbyterian College, and the names of Peter Brown, George Brown, and Oliver Mowat are found on the committee. The object of the society was "the extinction of slavery all over the world by means exclusively lawful and peaceable, moral and religious, such as the diffusion of useful information and argument by tracts, newspapers, lectures, and correspondence, and by manifesting sympathy with the houseless and homeless victims of slavery flying to our soil." Concerts were given, and the proceeds applied in aid of the refugees.

Brown was also strongly interested in the settlements of refugees established throughout Western Canada. Under an act of the Canadian parliament "for the settlement and moral improvement of the coloured population of Canada," large tracts of land were acquired, divided into fifty acre lots, and sold to refugees at low prices, payable in instalments. Sunday schools and day schools were established. The moving spirit in one of these settlements was the Rev. William King, a Presbyterian, formerly of Louisiana, who had freed his own slaves and brought them to Canada. Traces of these settlements still exist.

Either in this way or otherwise, there were large numbers of coloured people living in the valley of the Thames (from Chatham to London), in St. Catharines, Hamilton, and Toronto.

At the annual meeting of the Anti-Slavery Society in 1852, Mr. Brown moved a resolution expressing grat.i.tude to those American clergymen who had exposed the atrocities of the Fugitive Slave Law. He showed how, before its enactment, slaves were continually escaping to the Northern States, where they were virtually out of reach of their masters. There was a law enabling the latter to recover their property, but its edge was dulled by public opinion in the North, which was rapidly growing antagonistic to allowing the free states to become a hunting-ground for slave-catchers. The South took alarm at the growth of this feeling, and procured the pa.s.sage of a more stringent law. This law enabled the slave-holder to seize the slave wherever he found him, without warrant, and it forbade the freeman to shelter the refugee under penalty of six months" imprisonment, a fine of one thousand dollars, and liability to a civil suit for damages to the same amount. The enforcement of the law was given to federal instead of to State officials. After giving several ill.u.s.trations of the working of the law, Mr. Brown proceeded to discuss the duty of Canada in regard to slavery. It was a question of humanity, of Christianity, and of liberty, in which all men were interested. Canada could not escape the contamination of a system existing so near her borders. "We, too, are Americans; on us, as well as on them, lies the duty of preserving the honour of the continent. On us, as on them, rests the n.o.ble trust of shielding free inst.i.tutions."

Having long borne the blame of permitting slavery, the people of the North naturally expected that when the great struggle came they would receive the moral support of the civilized world in its effort to check and finally to crush out the evil. They were shocked and disappointed when this support was not freely and generously given, and when sympathy with the South showed itself strongly in Great Britain. Brown dealt with this question in a speech delivered in Toronto shortly after Lincoln"s proclamation of emanc.i.p.ation. He had just returned from Great Britain, and he said that in his six months"

journey through England and Scotland, he had conversed with persons in all conditions of life, and he was sorry to say that general sympathy was with the South. This did not proceed from any change in the feeling towards slavery. Hatred of slavery was as strong as ever, but it was not believed that African slavery was the real cause of the war, or that Mr. Lincoln sincerely desired to bring the traffic to an end. This misunderstanding he attributed to persistent misrepresentation. There were men who rightly understood the merits of the contest, and among these he placed the members of the British ministry. The course of the ministry he described as one of scrupulous neutrality, and firm resistance to the invitations of other powers to interfere in the contest.

Brown himself never for a moment failed to understand the nature of the struggle, and he showed an insight, remarkable at that time, into the policy of Lincoln. The anti-slavery men of Canada, he said, had an important duty to discharge. "We, who have stood here on the borders of the republic for a quarter of a century, protesting against slavery as the sum of all human villainies--we, who have closely watched every turn of the question--we, who have for years acted and sympathized with the good men of the republic in their efforts for the freedom of their country--we, who have a practical knowledge of the atrocities of the "peculiar inst.i.tution," learned from the lips of the panting refugee upon our sh.o.r.es--we, who have in our ranks men all known on the other side of the Atlantic as life-long abolitionists--we, I say, are in a position to speak with confidence to the anti-slavery men of Great Britain--to tell them that they have not rightly understood this matter--to tell them that slavery is the one great cause of the American rebellion, and that the success of the North is the death-knell of slavery. Strange, after all that has pa.s.sed, that a doubt of this should remain."

It was true, he said, that Lincoln was not elected as an abolitionist.

Lincoln declared, and the Republican party declared, that they stood by the const.i.tution; that they would, so far as the const.i.tution allowed, restrict slavery and prevent its extension to new territory.

Yet they knew that the const.i.tution gave them all they desired. "Well did they know, and well did the Southerners know, that any anti-slavery president and congress, by their direct power of legislation, by their control of the public patronage, and by the application of the public moneys, could not only restrict slavery within its present boundaries, but could secure its ultimate abolition. The South perfectly comprehended that Mr. Lincoln, if elected, might keep within the letter of the const.i.tution and yet sap the foundation of the whole slave system, and they acted accordingly."

In answering the question, "Why did not the North let the slave states go in peace?" Brown freely admitted the right of revolution. "The world no longer believes in the divine right of either kings or presidents to govern wrong; but those who seek to change an established government by force of arms a.s.sume a fearful responsibility--a responsibility which nothing but the clearest and most intolerable injustice will acquit them for a.s.suming." Here was a rebellion, not to resist injustice but to perpetuate injustice; not to deliver the oppressed from bondage, but to fasten more hopelessly than ever the chains of slavery on four millions of human beings. Why not let the slave states go? Because it would have been wrong, because it would have built up a great slave power that no moral influence could reach, a power that would have overawed the free Northern States, added to its territory, and re-established the slave trade. Had Lincoln permitted the slave states to go, and to form such a power, he would have brought enduring contempt upon his name, and the people of England would have been the first to reproach him.

Brown argued, as he had done in 1852, that Canada could not be indifferent to the question, whether the dominant power of the North American continent should be slave or free. Holding that liberty had better securities under the British than under the American system, he yet believed that the failure of the American experiment would be a calamity and a blow to free inst.i.tutions all over the world. For years the United States had been the refuge of the oppressed in every land; millions had fled from poverty in Europe to find happiness and prosperity there. From these had been wafted back to Europe new ideas of the rights of the people. With the fall of the United States this impetus to freedom, world-wide in its influence, would cease. Demands for popular rights and free const.i.tutions would be met by the despotic rulers of Europe with the taunt that in the United States free const.i.tutions and popular rights had ended in disruption and anarchy.

"Let us not forget that there have been, and still are, very different monarchies in the world from that of our own beloved queen; and a.s.suredly there are not so many free governments on earth that we should hesitate to devise earnestly the success of that one nearest to our own, modelled from our own, and founded by men of our own race. I do most heartily rejoice, for the cause of liberty, that Mr. Lincoln did not patiently acquiesce in the dismemberment of the republic."

The Civil War in the United States raised the most important question of foreign policy with which the public men of Canada were called upon to deal in Brown"s career. The dismemberment of the British empire would hardly have exercised a more profound influence on the human race and on world-wide aspirations for freedom, than the dismemberment of the United States and the establishment on this continent of a mighty slave empire. Canada could not be indifferent to the issue. How long would the slave-holding power, which coerced the North into consenting to the Fugitive Slave Law, have tolerated the existence of a free refuge for slaves across the lakes? Either Canada would have been forced to submit to the humiliation of joining in the hunt for men, or the British empire would have been obliged to fight the battle that the North fought under the leadership of Lincoln. In the face of this danger confronting Canada and the empire and freedom, it was a time to forget smaller international animosities. Brown was one of the few Canadian statesmen who saw the situation clearly and rose to the occasion. For twenty years by his public speeches, and still more through the generous devotion of the _Globe_ to the cause, he aided the cause of freedom and of the union of the lovers of freedom.

CHAPTER XII

BROWN AND THE ROMAN CATHOLICS

That the _Globe_ and Mr. Brown, as related in a previous chapter, became a.s.sociated with Lord John Russell"s bill and the "no popery"

agitation in England, may be regarded as a mere accident. The excitement would have died out here as it died out in England, if there had not been in Canada such a ma.s.s of inflammable material--so many questions in which the relations of Church and State were involved. One of these was State endowment of denominational schools.

During Brown"s early years in Canada the school system was being placed on a broad and popular basis. Salaries of teachers were wretchedly low. Fees were charged to children, and remitted only as an act of charity. Mr. Brown advocated a free and unsectarian system.

Claims for denominational schools were put forward not only by the Roman Catholics but by the Anglicans. He argued that if this were allowed the public school system would be destroyed by division. The country could barely afford to maintain one good school system. To maintain a system for each denomination would require an immense addition to the number of school-houses and teachers, and would absorb the whole revenue of the province. At the same time, the educational forces would be weakened by the division and thousands of children would grow up without education. "Under the non-sectarian system,"

said Brown, "the day is at hand when we may hope to abolish the school-tax and offer free education to every child in the province."